


Memories Of A Toy

by Live



Series: Strifehart Winter Week 2017 [4]
Category: Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy VIII
Genre: Canon Memory Less Due To GFs, Childhood Memories, Dreams, Fairy Tale Elements, Family Bonding, M/M, Memory Loss, Pre-Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-27
Updated: 2017-12-27
Packaged: 2019-02-22 19:00:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,081
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13173189
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Live/pseuds/Live
Summary: Day 4 of Strifehart Winterweek 2017: Nutcracker or Toy MakerIt's a wooden toy with yellow points for hair and black and purple fabric wrapped around it for clothes. It was Squall's favourite toy as a child, he can't remember it...





	Memories Of A Toy

**Author's Note:**

> It was meant to be Nutcracker, but I ended up fusing a bunch of fairy tales (so you'll probably see Vasilisa the Beautiful and Howl's Moving Castle influences and more probably XD). Hope you guys enjoy!!!!

“You’ve got a lot of weird antiques,” Squall notes as he walks behind his sister in their father’s house. She had insisted on hiking through all the dust to explore their memories: Squall was only humouring her so they could spend some time together. He was trying to relearn what being a sibling meant.

“We’ve got a lot of old antiques,” she corrects, smiles over her shoulder at him. “Some of this stuff is yours.”

“I can’t imagine,” Squall drawls (he honestly can’t, they’d just passed a dream catcher that had a Cactuar sewn into it. It’s not something Squall would want and he can’t imagine his younger self ever asking for it. It couldn’t be his). 

“For example, this,” Ellone picks up a wooden toy. Yellow spikes protrude from the top of the small figure and purple and black woollen clothes wraps around the wooden body. It looks like one of the SOLDIER figurines that Squall knows Zell collects, but it’s not one that looks familiar. At all.

“You can’t be serious,” Squall raises a brow, he can’t imagine playing with something like that (he can’t imagine himself playing at all if he’s honest).

“Well technically,” Ellone grins at him. “It was mine. Mother gave it to me, but you kept wanting to play with it and I didn’t have the heart to turn you away. You hardly ever parted with it after I said you could have it.”

“Really?” Squall can’t remember ever being so attached to an inanimate object... he guesses children are just weird, child him included.

“Don’t want to keep it now in your old age?” Ellone teases. Squall grunts.

“I’m not that old,” he disagrees, before lightly shoving his sister. “Can we go yet or are you still looking at memories?”

“We can go,” she smiles at the toy in her hand, before gently (so delicately as though it would break from being placed anywhere). “Dad should be back from work soon.”

“Great,” Squall sighs and questions, not for the first time, why he agreed to go to his father’s for the holidays. He’s gone his whole life without celebrating the holidays, he doesn’t get why he should now that he remembers his family.

...

That night he dreams. Vivid dreams of a blond haired soldier endlessly fighting long silver strands. 

He dreams of angry blue eyes that never stray from the silver maelstrom. He dreams of a world filled with despair and he wakes up weeping.

He doesn’t sleep again that night. Rolls on his bed restlessly, praying the tears he wiped away won’t engrave guilty trails behind. He doesn’t want to explain he was crying over a dream (doesn’t know how to explain he was crying over a dream).

———

“You get a good night’s rest?” Laguna asks him in the morning. The man is trying to help Ellone with breakfast, but she keeps knocking his hands away whenever he touches anything. 

“Sit down Dad,” she laughs at Laguna, distracting the man from the question he asked (which is Squall’s preferred outcome). 

Laguna huffs. “I’m the Dad here, I should be making you two breakfast.”

“I actually follow what the recipe says you should do,” Ellone argues, brandishing a spatula as a weapon.

“Eggs hardly need instructions,” Laguna protests. Still he raises his hands in defeat, when Ellone warningly jabs her spatula forward.

“OK, OK,” Laguna sighs, plopping into the seat opposite Squall. “Woman always have to be right, eh Squall?”

“They usually are right,” Squall replies (because, he knew which of the three in this room currently is threatening violence and he knows at least four more outside of this house who would follow through with it).

“Of course,” Laguna smiles. Neither knowing how to converse yet. It’s a sad thought, thinking of how their family is full of strangers.

“You were asking Squall how his sleep was,” Ellone chimes in, trying to help the two of them connect (Laguna can’t help, but be thankful for it). 

“Of course! Was worried the mattress in the spare room wouldn’t feel great,” Laguna confesses. “It was alright though?”

“Yeah...” Squall admits. “The mattress was fine. I didn’t get much sleep though.”

“Ah, guess you’re used to sleeping elsewhere,” Laguna awkwardly rubs the back of his neck. “If I had looked for you a little harder maybe that wouldn’t-”

“It’s not that,” Squall interrupts, because their orphan years weren’t bad and they really needed to stop dragging guilt into their relationship. It was nobody’s fault. “Just weird dreams.”

Laguna’s eyes go to Ellone at that. Squall rolls his.

“Not those kind of weird dreams...” Squall doesn’t know to explain what he experienced, but it didn’t feel like when Ellone made him relive his father’s past. “It was like watching a film... there was some fight with impractical looking swords. It was just weird.”

“You should tell me about it later,” Ellone smiles as she places her masterpiece of eggs on toast in front of them. “For now you should appreciate my cooking.”

“Thanks,” Squall says and is surprised when Laguna doesn’t automatically chime in with his usual praise. Looking up he see Laguna raising a sceptical brow at Ellone, who just smiles at their father and goes to gets her own plate.

Odd... but not as odd as the dream he experiences later.

...

Squall knows he’s himself when he enters the land of dreams. Can feel it thrum within his very being. In this dream he’s Squall Leonhart, son of Laguna and Raine Loire. Not that the dream version of himself would know that, after all he’s reliving his time as a child in this dream.

“Cloud,” his childish voice says softly. In his chubby hands there’s the toy Ellone had shown him the day prior.

There’s an inquiring hum in response. Squall can’t see anyone that could have responded to him and his younger self hasn’t torn his eyes away from the toy. 

“You’re really strong right?” Squall’s little voice asks and Squall can’t ever remember sounding that vulnerable.

“Not particularly,” the voice answers and Squall’s not sure, but the voice resonates with him. Makes him feel calm, relaxed, like it belongs to someone he’s known his whole life.

“But, Ellone said you fought off an entire calamity,” little Squall insists. 

“I wasn’t alone in that fight,” the voice brushes off. “And it’s not like I’m strong like this.”

“I think you’re strong Cloud,” Squall feels his child form smile at the toy.

“Whatever you say, kid.”

He wakes to Laguna’s worried face. His mind is foggy and he can barely think straight. He rubs at his eyes, trying to make sense of everything. He feels like he’s forgotten something vital, that his dream was important, but...

“What are you doing Laguna?” He asks.

“You’re usually up by now. Was worried about you,” Laguna admits. “You feeling alright?”

“Yeah... fine...” Squall rolls out of bed. The clock reaffirms Laguna’s story. It’s 10am, Squall never sleeps in. He shrugs it off.

“Any breakfast left over?”

———

Squall sighs into the dust coated air. He’s back in the storage room that Ellone had dragged him in the other day, this time he’s by himself. Looking for a vase of all things. Laguna had gone out earlier after checking on him and had come back with a massive bouquet for Ellone, who insisted there was a vase in here that would fit them all.

He’d found a bunch of empty potion vials that had been stacked in a corner behind a gramophone, and he’d found a dented brass jug that had been stored in here for whatever reason. He’d left the door open behind him and it brought a light breeze which had awoken a wind chime somewhere in the room (Squall couldn’t see it though, he was just left with the sound of light tinkling). This room really needed to be cleaned and organised.

Rubbing a hand across his face he dared to walk further into the room. Following the same route his sister had shown him, though his trek was slower having to stop to manoeuvre things to get a better look for this so called vase. He stilled as he came across the SOLDIER toy. The vase was clearly nowhere near the toy, the area around it being well kept and tidy. But, it was the toy and his dream that kept him rooted to the spot. 

He reached out and picked it up.

Up close he could see the toy had been carved in a strange polygon form, which caused the pauldrons on his shoulders to bulge out. On the little SOLDIER’s back sat a sword as big as the toy was: Squall snorted that was just ridiculous. What was it about large weapons on toys that was meant to appeal to children?

He ran his hands along the wood and cloth. What was it about the toy that had kept his attention as a child? He couldn’t imagine there was any appeal in an old wooden toy. What was it he had called it?

“Cloud?” Squall questioned himself out loud. Sounding the syllables out as though it would help place the memory/dream.

He jumped to attention as movement came to life on his hand. His eyes darting down to witness the wooden SOLDIER stretching out its arms high above its head, one leg sprawled to the side and the other knee bending to accommodate the stretch. Squall had no idea what business a wooden toy had needing to stretch out its limbs, but that’s what the figure was doing.

“You take a long time to wake someone up,” the same voice from his dream intones. Squall stares at the toy.

“Cloud?” He questions slowly, because it sounds ridiculous, but was the toy actually-

The toy hums an affirmative. And looks up at him. Blue (green?) eyes blink, honest to Hyne BLINK, at him. “You alright Squall?” 

The loud bang as Squall jolted back into a desk behind him may answer more honestly than he can verbally admit. No... No he doesn’t feel too good right now.

“Squall?” He hears Laguna’s voice call up.

“Just knocked something over!” He calls back, his automatic defence of dismissing people kicking in. “It’s fine! I’m fine!”

“Alright!” Laguna calls back and Squall is left to figure out what’s happened to his sanity.

“Laguna finally came back then?” The toy (Cloud?) snorts in his hand. Looking back Squall can see the toy’s disproportionate arms folded over his chest. “You coping with it alright?”

“Better than the fact a toy is talking to me,” Squall answers, and this shouldn’t be so shocking (after all if Rinoa can teach Angelo to do the ridiculous things she can do, surely someone can make a toy that speaks and moves... and seems to know him...).

“Yeah, I can see that,” the figure doesn’t have a mouth, but Squall swears there’s a smirk there, somehow. “You dealt with this better as a kid.”

“I guess,” Squall can’t remember, but Ellone said this was his favourite toy so it must have spoken to him at some point?

“So what are you in here for?” The toy asks.

“Ellone was after a vase,” Squall admits.

“I’ll help you look,” and the toy jumps off his hand, jumps more than a meter (which doesn’t sound impressive until you realise this was a tiny toy that should surely break from that height) just to help him find the stupid vase for Ellone. He succeeds and offers his service if Squall needs it again before posing and going still again.

Squall doesn’t manage to get the toy to come back to life again that evening. With a sigh he takes the vase to Ellone and heads to bed early (all the while a weird looking toy is safely hidden in his jacket’s pocket).

...

He knows his dream that night is a memory. It feels vaguely like something he’s experienced (and apparently the toy talking is kind of real).

“Cloud,” his child self blubbers, rubbing fruitlessly at his eyes as tears gather up. 

“You OK?” The toy asks and little wooden hands (arm stumps?) actually wipe at the tears streaming down his face.

“Just everyone’s leaving... I don’t want to lose anyone else,” and it’s been a while since Squall’s felt like that, but it’s an emotion he’s familiar with. He can’t stand losing people, there was a time when he’d rather avoid people than lose them but... he understands now that sometimes the risk of heartbreak is worth it. 

“It’s alright to feel that way,” the toy comforts, the wooden hand stays pressed against his cheek. “Just don’t stay that way forever, ok?”

“Ok,” little Squall nods his agreement, sniffling to try and stop the tears. The toy laughs at him under his breath, younger Squall doesn’t notice, but the present dreaming Squall does and he wonders what would make him laugh right now? What was the toy thinking? Could he think?

“You’ll always be here, right?” Little Squall asks once he’s got his crying under control.

“As long as you call me, I’ll answer,” the toy reassures him.

He wakes up slowly and groggily. He turns over to look at the toy he placed of his bedside table. 

“Cloud?” He tries. The figure stretches his arms, falling into a casual sitting pose, one hand posed in front of his face as though he’s yawning.

“What’s up?” Cloud asks.

“I can’t remember you,” Squall admits, his dreams withstanding he has no recollection of him.

“I figured that out,” Cloud snorts, one leg swings over the side of the table.

“Sorry,” Squall mutters.

“Ah, it’s fine,” Cloud reassures, one hand waving in the air dismissively. “Get some more sleep alright?”

Squall does.

———

Squall strolls down the stairs for breakfast after a surprisingly dreamless second sleep. He stops outside the kitchen when he hears rushed words inside.

“Are you sure Squall should be remembering?” Laguna asks, sounding ever so slightly panicked.

“Cloud is family, Squall deserves to remember him,” Ellone stresses. “He deserves to remember everything, but especially this.”

“I’m not saying he doesn’t deserve to remember!” Laguna defends. “I just remember the stress Raine went through trying to help Cloud, are you sure you want that for Squall?”

“They both deserve to be happy,” Ellone insists. “This will make them happy.”

“Are you sure?” Laguna languishes. “I just want Squall to be alright.”

“He-”

“Can make his own decisions,” Squall says as he leans on the door frame. The two startle and turn to him, Laguna particularly looking like a child caught eating cookies before dinner. “What are you two going on about?”

“It’s about the toy I showed you the other day,” Ellone started.

“Ok,” Squall raises a brow, he gathered that (he guesses Ellone doesn’t know how much he knows about Cloud yet).

“Are you sure you want to know Squall?” Laguna asks. “It’s something your mother’s family have been protecting for years...”

That... that he doesn’t know anything about, but. “Tell me.”

And so over breakfast it’s explained what he once knew, before the GFs ate at his memories. It’s explained how the toy was once a man that was cursed into the form he is now. How an ancestor of Squall’s was a dear friend of that man and thus the toy decided to stay with that family, to look over them. It was explained that no one had ever discovered a way to get rid of the curse, most had given up.

“Why wouldn’t you want to tell me that?” Squall had asked Laguna, surely it would be cruel to not know?

“Raine... she tirelessly tried to find a way to turn him back. She never found one and Cloud never seemed interested in finding a way himself,” Laguna tried smiling at Squall, it came off as more of a grimace. “I don’t want you to have go through all that. You have enough on your plate as SeeD commander.”

“And he doesn’t want to be a grandfather yet,” Ellone cheekily added, causing their father to splutter.

“What?” Squall frowned, where did that come from?

“We don’t know why, but he only reacts to the voice of direct descendants of his friend. You’re the only one, so you’ll have to have a child if you don’t want Cloud to become a motionless toy forever,” Ellone grins, amused. “Time to make me an auntie, already.”

With a roll of his eyes he excuses himself (and ignores Ellone’s teasing). When he enters the guest room his eyes automatically fall onto Cloud’s seemingly lifeless form.

“Cloud,” he calls out. The toy springs to life once again and looks at him enquiringly. “Ellone and Laguna told me about you.”

“I’d be surprised if they didn’t,” Cloud shrugs. 

Squall falls onto the bed. His bones feel heavy as he sits on the edge, but he resists just falling asleep (not that he’ll have a choice if Ellone decides to show him another memory). 

“Are you happy stuck as a toy?” Squall asks him. 

“There are worse fates,” Cloud confesses.

...

He dreams of emotions Squall cannot recall feeling that night. It’s a surreal dream that he can’t quite grasp. 

Security.

Happiness.

Innocence.

“I love you Cloud,” his childish voice is clear through the fog of memories.

Squall wakes up as confused of his childhood memories as he always is. He is aware though of the way his heart quickens and his eyes linger on Cloud. Why did Ellone make him dream that?

———

“You having a good time over there?” Rinoa’s voice comes through the speaker as Squall takes a break from his workout.

“Could be worse,” Squall responds, much to Rinoa’s displeasure.

“You’re meant to say yes and tell me what an amazing trip it is!” She huffs.

“Fine,” Squall rolls his eyes. “Everything is amazing and you were right I needed to go on this trip.”

“I told you so,” Rinoa laughs and Squall can’t help but smile. She was truly ridiculous sometimes, no one would suspect she was the sorceress. “So why did you call if you’re having such a good time?”

“What do you know on curses?” He asks. 

“Why? Wanting to wake someone up with a true loves kiss?” Rinoa teases, much to Squall’s displeasure (she always insisted he was a romantic: he was not).

“No,” he shakes his head even though she can’t see it. “It’s Just I met someone who has a curse on them.”

“Well... then it’s usually up to either the person who put the curse on them to undo it, or the person who’s cursed needs to figure out what it is about them that has the curse sticking with them,” Rinoa explains, it leaves Squall humming in thought.

“So, the second option is preferred?” Squall asks.

“You’d think so, but it’s really not,” Rinoa corrects. “For example say someone put a curse on you for being too selfish, that’s a negative personality trait that the cursed person has to confess to owning, and then figure out a way to get rid of it without the curse thinking you’re just changing your ways to get rid of it. It has to be an honest change of heart and then there’s always the chance the curse on you is a negative one for example if someone cursed you for being too nice.”

“That’s-” Squall sighs.

“Complicated, right?” Rinoa laughs. “Always easier to go straight to the person who gave them the curse. Good luck though!”

When Squall asks Cloud before he sleeps that night who gave him the curse, the toy looks away. Squall didn’t know a toy could look high-strung, but that’s what he’s witnessing.

“They’re dead... have been for a long time.”

...

He dreams of a man that night. A man with blue eyes that glow in an impossible way. A man with blonde hair that sticks up in gravity defying spikes. The man holds the hand of one small child, laying asleep in his other in a brown haired baby. The impossible man stands in, what Squall can tell is, Winhill. The three figures are walking away from the village.

“Where are we going Cloud?” The little girl asks. 

“We can’t stay here any longer,” the impossible man explains. “I’ll take you two somewhere safe.”

“What about Mum?” The little girl asks.

“She won’t be able to come with us anyone,” the impossible man confesses, squeezing the small girl’s hand. “But, I promise I’ve done all I can for Raine.”

“She’ll be ok?”

“As ok as she can be,” the impossible man smiles.

“What about Dad?” She asks.

“He’ll find us as soon as he’s able,” he reassures and the little girl settles down, comfortable to walk beside the man. “Let me know if you get tired, alright? I’ll carry you.”

“You’re already carrying Squall, I’ll be fine,” she insists.

“If you say so.”

Squall wakes up with his eyes on Cloud.

———

“You’re not cursed,” Squall accuses once he’s re-awoken Cloud to the real world.

“I am,” Cloud disagrees.

“You can turn human though, can’t you?” Squall raises a brow, his legs are stretched out on the bed as he sits up against the bed’s frame.

“Yes,” Cloud sighs.

“Why don’t you stay that way?” Squall asks. 

“I had the curse put on me on purpose… There was a man named Sephiroth. No matter how many times I defeated or killed him he would come back. We discovered he was using me as his point of access between life and death... I have his cells in my blood and he was manipulating that somehow... we couldn’t figure out what would happen when I died, but I couldn’t risk him coming back when it happened, so I had this done to myself,” he explained.

“Why do you only respond to my family then?” Squall asked, his mind filled with questions. “What IS your curse? A friend explained you need to undo what the curse thinks of you to get rid of it, how can yours keep coming back?”

“Well your friend isn’t wrong... Sephiroth always claimed I was his puppet, the way he used my mind and then my blood kind of proved him right. We used that as the curse’s base, a wooden puppet can’t have blood after all. Though this form,” Cloud holds out his little wooden arms. “Was originally meant to have strings, but well... I turned out like this. As for how the curse doesn’t always affect me, if I’m doing something Sephiroth wouldn’t want me to, then I’m not acting as his puppet. The second he tries to use my blood to get back from the dead though I’ll be turned back.”

“He’s still trying?” Squall asks.

“He won’t stop,” Cloud shakes his head. “As for why I can react to your family, my childhood friend wasn’t happy with my decision and interfered.”

“Your childhood friend?” Squall asks.

“Tifa Lockhart,” Cloud sounds amused. “Your ancestor. I don’t know how Lockhart turned into Leonhart, but she had the curse changed ever so slightly so she’d be able to keep me company. I don’t know if she intended her descendants to have the same power, but well... knowing her she probably did.”

“So, you’re keeping the curse?” Squall asks.

“I have to,” The little toy shoulders shrug. “If there was another way then maybe. But, my life isn’t worth having Sephiroth trying to destroy the world again. And didn’t I already tell you? Being cursed isn’t too bad.”

...

Ellone finds Squall the next day contacting his friends before she’s even begun to make breakfast. She watches her brother pace the kitchen back and forth (and back and forth) all the while talking a mile a minute: she’s never seen him speak for so long. When he notices her, his eyes light up.

“Right, see you later Selphie,” he says into the phone before grinning at Ellone.

“You leaving?” Ellone asks.

“Yeah... Sorry,” but his grin hasn’t dimmed, if anything it’s brighter. “Also you’re not getting nieces or nephews.”

“What?” Ellone splutters. “But, don’t you want Cloud to have someone.”

“He’ll have me once we’ve figured how to safely get rid of his curse,” Squall’s grin is contagious and Ellone can’t help but grin back.

“That almost sounds like a confession of love, oh brother of mine,” she laughs.

Squall just shakes his head, turning back to his phone, but not before dismissing Ellone with a completely insincere “whatever”.

**Author's Note:**

> I hope Rinoa and Cloud's long explanations on the curse makes sense and that the ending doesn't feel too abrupt. Was worried they were a little rushed!!!
> 
> Also, why do I keep writing Squall as the one who's confident about where he is in their relationships??? He's meant to be just as useless as Cloud is in all things relationship-y XD Anyways I hope you enjoy and see you tomorrow for the final part of this wonderful Strifehart Winter Week T^T (I'll be writing more afterwards I promise, I have so many ideas for these two that have been building up over the years XD)


End file.
